


never is a promise (and you can't afford to lie)

by Anonymous



Category: The Amberlough Dossier Series - Lara Elena Donnelly
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-22 02:21:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17051231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Cyril can’t quite pinpoint when things began to change. When lust turned into affection and indifference slipped into intimacy. It had taken them both by surprise, he thinks, and they each hid that surprise well, burying it deep rather than acknowledging its existence.





	never is a promise (and you can't afford to lie)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skazkanasmorka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skazkanasmorka/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide, skazkanasmorka.

There’s a moment - more than one, if he’s honest with himself - where Cyril wants to tell Ari about the deal he made with the Ospies.

He almost confesses the night they meet in the basement of the Stevedore. There’s a weariness that curls around him and sinks bone deep, and he wants nothing more than for this whole charade to be over. Ari notices, of course, and the way he touches Cyril with such unexpected concern and affection is _almost_ enough to make him spill all his secrets.

But he can’t quite work up the courage to say anything. Instead, he lets Ari kiss him, harsh and desperate, and watches him walk away, trying to convince himself that it’s for the best.

 

*

 

They’ve always had an unspoken agreement to never ask personal questions. 

It was fine in the beginning. Those first few weeks were a haze of flirting and fucking, sniping and teasing. It was heady and thrilling, an affair fueled by desire that was borne of weeks spent circling each other.

They’d done their fair share of digging into each other’s lives - a necessity brought on by both their chosen careers - but they’d avoided any actual discussion about the information they’d found. Even Ari, usually so clever and coy, hadn’t mentioned the then fresh scar running down Cyril’s midsection. He’d traced the scar one of the nights they’d holed up in Cyril’s room at the Citadel, but he hadn’t asked any questions.

Cyril can’t quite pinpoint when things began to change. When lust turned into affection and indifference slipped into intimacy. It had taken them both by surprise, he thinks, and they each hid that surprise well, burying it deep rather than acknowledging its existence. 

It makes Cyril melancholy to think of it. He yearns to return to the days before he was sent back into the field, when his biggest concerns were hangovers and the dull monotony of a desk life. When he had the luxury of spending his nights and mornings in Ari’s bed without the worry of someone truly using it against him.

 _You could have that again_ , he thinks mournfully. 

The thought stays with him after he watches Ari leave, and not for the first time, Cyril regrets all the decisions that brought him to his current predicament.

 

*

 

Cyril expects his meeting with Ari at the Stevedore to be their last, so he truly doesn’t expect to run into Ari at The Bee.

Whenever he’s visited Cordelia, he’s always made certain that it’s when Ari is not around. It’s easy enough to slip into her dressing room when she and Ari on stage, and far better for him to avoid having to sit through a performance he can’t genuinely enjoy.

Something about the surprise encounter in Cordelia’s dressing room makes him hesitate, though. He thinks about the longing and desperation he felt watching Ari walk away from him, and it makes him linger in the corridor after he slips out of Cordelia’s dressing room.

He doesn’t have to wait long. When Ari exits, Cyril grabs his arm and tugs him into an alcove.

Ari stares at him in surprise, before his lips purse in displeasure. “You shouldn’t be here,” he says.

Cyril sighs, and then before he can regret it, says, “We need to talk.”

 

*

 

“I was scratched in Nuesklend,” he says. “There’s a mole in the Foxhole who gave me up. I still haven’t figured out who it is.”

They’re in Ari’s dressing room, as safe a place for any for this conversation, though the fact that they’re even discussing it put Cyril on edge. There’s a small, cautious part of him that wonders if he’s made the right decision.

“I suspected as much,” Ari says. He’s leaning against the doorway, still clad in his silk costume from the show, his makeup smeared where it creases at the corner of his eyes.

“I made a deal,” Cyril says. He laughs hollowly, because it really turned out to be anything but a deal. “I agreed to play turncoat and tie up the ACPD if they gave me a visa out of the country.”

“They agreed to the visa?” Ari’s voice is sharp, and it makes Cyril flinch.

“That’s not all,” he says miserably. “I asked for a second one. For...a friend. It didn’t take long for them to guess who I meant. I told you they knew my sticking points.”

There’s a long moment of silence, and then he hears Ari move toward him. He tips Cyril’s chin up and stares down at him, and there’s something heartbreakingly vulnerable in his expression.

“ _Oh_ ,” he breathes out, his voice breaking slightly. He runs a thumb gently over the line of Cyril’s jaw. “Oh, Cyril, what have you gotten yourself into?”

 

*

 

“I could have helped,” Ari says later, long after they’ve left The Bee for the security of Ari’s flat. “You _know_ I could have helped you. The Ospies would never give you one visa, let alone a second.”

“I know,” Cyril says. “I was trying to keep you out of it. I wanted to fix my own mess.”

Ari snorts. “Look where that landed you.”

Cyril slumps against the back of the sofa, too tired to argue. He watches Ari move about his rooms with a strange sense of lightheadedness, which seems at odds with the way Ari furiously rifles through his drawers and cabinets.

“I can get us papers,” Ari says. “Not tonight, but soon. We’ll have to leave separately.”

“What?” Cyril asks, and there must be some measure of panic in his voice because Ari pauses and shoots him a look.

“We can’t travel together. It’s safer for me to do this on my own, and for you to follow later.”

It makes Cyril uneasy, but he agrees nonetheless. As much as he doesn’t want to let Ari out of his sight, not now that he’s shared all his secrets, he doesn’t really have any other choice.

“It’ll be fine,” Ari says, and he places a hand on top of Cyril’s, draws him up and towards the bedroom. Cyril wants to laugh - or cry, perhaps - because it’s been _so_ long and he’s missed Ari so very much.

 

*

 

He spends the next two days anxiously waiting for something - anything - to go wrong. He’s filled with the same sense of dread he had the first time he was scratched. Yet, as far as he can tell, there have been no suspicions aroused within the Foxhole, and Culpepper seems content to keep her watchful eye on his activities. But he knows better than to assume he’s in the clear.

He follows Ari’s instructions to the letter, and buys a newspaper from the girl Ari had instructed him to visit on the morning of the second day. There’s a thick envelope hidden inside, and when he checks it, he finds new identification and a packet of money. It’s enough to buy him a train ticket out of Amberlough, and more than enough to use as a bribe if such a situation arises.

There’s a letter that he folds and puts in his pocket. He reads it later, when he’s waiting on the train platform.

He’s had doubts, of course. Has wondered if he shouldn’t disappear somewhere else entirely on the off chance that he’s followed. Or worse, in case someone else knows where he’s headed. Ari has already left the city and arrived in their final destination by now, and the last thing Cyril wants to do is compromise either of them.

But Ari’s letter - written so carefully and so thick with emotion that’s foreign to them both - halts those thoughts.

When the train pulls into the platform, he steps aboard and lets Amberlough fade into the distance behind him.


End file.
